Philocrites

Flirting with Emergent, part II.

by Thom Belote

Thanks to all, including some old (well, "old") buddies who've responded to the post on Emergent.

For three consecutive Sundays in late June / early July I was a "mystery worshipper" at Jacob's Well, located in Kansas City and one of the leading Emergent congregations in the country. Before offering my answers to the questions I asked about the possibility of a UU church adopting the "Emergent style", I want to comment on and describe the experienceb of worshipping there.

Jacob's Well is located in midtown Kansas City. It meets in the old Roanoke Presbyterian Church, which one would assume Jacob's Well bought from a dwindling main-line congregation. However, I've also heard that Jacob's Well's minister, Tim Keel, has Presbyterian connections so I would be interested to know the story behind its planting.

Anyways, the first thing I noticed when I arrived for worship...

...was how young the congregation was. I'd say 95% were under 35 years old. The second thing I noticed was the low-key level welcoming. I was not greeted "warmly" and felt free to be an anonymous visitor. They were definitely not trying to sell me their Church. On the other hand, I was more or less perplexed about how I would get more involved. No name tags, no brochures, no announcements, no identification of leaders (ordained or lay). When I walked in I was handed a 8.5x5.5 piece of paper printed with print (orange) on one side that had Bible-readings for the week and some notes about mid-week programming.

And then the service began... (more later.)

Copyright © 2005 by Thom Belote | Posted 26 July 2005 at 6:50 PM

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